Blackbridge
The village of '''Blackbridge '''was the seat of a barony of the same name ruled from Fort Denholm by the patriarch of House Denholm. It supports its namesake bridge over the Black River, now a great ruin, that leads to a path through the Wosswood and to what was once Newstone to the west. Blackbridge was founded in 4E.886 under the reign of King Arthur Gardner of Bregate by the king's brother, Devin Gardner, who then went by Devin Denholm, starting an independent branch of the Yellow Rose. Before the rise of the Empire of Izevel, Blackbridge was ruled by Baron Vern Denholm from its aging castle; the village was truly protected, however, by its resident veteran adventurer and innkeep Gareth Donnelly. Blackbridge was also a parish of the Church of Sol; before the Sunscourge Heresy, it was shepherded by three different priests: Father Tihomir, Father Anselm, and finally, Father Daramus. Not long after the fall of its neighbor, Newstone, in 5E.1521, the plague came to Blackbridge, and though the village survived for a span longer, Blackbridge was largely abandoned by the time of the opening of the Worldwound and the subsequent Deluge. However, Nordagon of Deminster briefly lead a group of Solist rebels from within its ruins, and the ghostly village still sits, isolated, a monument to Bregate, Noslith, Sol, and the Heroes who earned their name fighting for it. Blackbridge was the home of the priest Anselm. Yorath usurped this priest's identity and home at some point in order to use his face to rise in the ranks of the Solist church on the backs of the Infernal Pact assassinations, actually committed on the orders of Tyffayne and Vaeilnor. Anselm left Blackbridge behind when he ascended to become Bishop of Bregate following the assassination of the previous bishop. The Heroes of Blackbridge Under Baron Vern's reign in the year 5E.1521, Blackbridge was host to the formation of a new adventuring party that would later become the Heroes of Blackbridge and eventually the Dawn's Herald. In the fall of 5E.1521, in the village's own inn and tavern, the Cat & Chicken, the adventurers Peredur Gower and Volkarr the Exile met the exorcist Brother Lemuel of Ryfall and the inquisitor Aldus when they together intervened against a group of farmhands harassing the young and inexperienced novice diviner Raiwen Talethar, an elven mage of Gaelathara. Lemuel and Aldus had been dispatched by the Church of Sol to investigate the disappearance of Father Tihomir and his entourage in the Wosswood, who were traveling by carriage to deliver disease-relief supplies to the beleaguered village of Newstone. Seemingly a minor mission, the heroes soon realized they may be in over their heads when they witnessed Tegwen the Enchantress taking special interest in the Wosswood and in their own investigations of the cursed forest. The heroes departed into the forest for some time, returning with tales of battle and, after the sacrifice of Aldus and the recruitment of Silas Rooke, the full tale of what had happened to Father Tihomir. He was waylaid and slain along with his guards and acolytes by a single assassin, who himself died of wounds incurred in the battle. The assassin wore an Infernal Pact medallion bearing the Nine-Pointed Star, and so on Anselm's direction, the Heroes made their way to Bregate, where a secret diabolist stronghold was said to dwell beneath the city streets.